


Wherever the hell Bolivia is

by merle_p



Category: Leverage
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-05
Updated: 2009-01-05
Packaged: 2017-10-06 18:26:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merle_p/pseuds/merle_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eliot hasn't seen his parents since he was four.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wherever the hell Bolivia is

**Author's Note:**

> Written January 2009.  
> Slight spoilers for 1.01, 1.03 and 1.04.  
> _Leverage_ belongs to TNT and Devlin/Downey/Rogers, the title is a quote from the movie _Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid_ ("Wherever the hell Bolivia is, that's where we're off to").

Eliot hasn't seen his parents since he was four. Or at least, that's what people told him later – he can't really remember how old he was. What he can remember is the blood. The noises. The feeling of a gun pressed against his back, of a large hand pressed over his mouth.   
Eliot doesn't need a new family.

Despite of what Eliot says, Alec is _not_ living with his mother. He's been staying at his loft for a couple of years now, and he likes it just fine. Which doesn't mean that he doesn't still keep in touch.  
When he takes Eliot home to meet his mom for the first time, she says: "So this the girl you been talkin' about?" Then she moves to get another plate, shaking her head. "Why didn't you just say so, boy? Would have bought bigger steaks if I'd known."

***

Eliot doesn't do friends. The last person he thought was his friend died when Eliot smashed his head against a brick wall. Several times. The police had to take fingerprints to ID him, because there was no face left for anyone to recognize. Eliot doesn't like people who betray their partners.

The first three times Alec asks Eliot if he wants to hang out, Eliot says no. The fourth time, he only stays because Alec has got this huge flat screen, and there's a big hockey game on TV. The fifth time, he brings the beer, and Alec grins like a Cheshire cat. The sixth time, he stays overnight.

***

When Eliot wants to see a movie, he goes to one of those tiny, run-down movie theaters that haven't given up the fight against the big AMCs yet. He sits in one of the last rows, slumps down in his seat and watches whatever they are showing. He doesn't own any DVDs, he doesn't own a DVD player, and the TV set only because it was already in the apartment when he moved in. Eliot doesn't have many possessions.

Alec has a shelf that holds about every Blu-ray disc that is on the market, and over three hundred video files on his hard drive. When he wants to see a movie he doesn't own yet, it takes him about five minutes to change that fact – if the movie has already been released or not.   
The first time he goes to the movies with Eliot, he says: "You know that my couch is much more comfortable than these seats?" and "You know that their sound system isn't worth shit?", until Eliot reaches over and starts to jack him off, right there in the nearly empty theater.  
"You know, that wasn't so bad", he says afterwards, and Eliot smiles, looking a bit surprised himself.

***

Eliot has never had a steady girlfriend (or boyfriend) in his life. Aimee is the one who came closest: He met her when he started working for her dad, and for a few years, he came and went, staying for a couple of months, disappearing for the next few. The promise ring he gave her never meant that one day, he'd stay for good, it simply meant that he'd come back.  
The problem was that she was _fascinated_ by the lonely wolf, but what she _loved_ was the idea of taming it – and when that didn't work, she married Bill: Who was as much of a wolf as Eliot was, but at least managed to stay around long enough to put another ring on her finger. Eliot doesn't do relationships.

Alec is too young to look back on a long list of conquests.  
He had a girlfriend in high school like everyone else, but they broke up in his senior year, and later, when he got involved with the wrong guys, there was a string of hook-ups, men and women, but no-one he could really trust, and he hardly ever slept with the same person twice.   
Still, he always knew that someday, he'd find someone, so it's no real surprise when it happens, even if he didn't expect it to be _him_, and after two weeks, he starts to go out and buy breakfast when he's the first to get up. Eliot looks like he doesn't know what to make of it, but he eats the donuts Alec gets him nonetheless.

***

Eliot found that the best thing about sex with men is that he doesn't need to be so careful. He knows that he can easily break a woman's wrists without even trying, and there is always the not completely irrational fear that he'll accidentally kill her in the heat of the moment. Of course, he can kill a man just as quickly, but at least he has to actually focus on it.  
Also, there's the fact that he likes to be fucked, and while a woman can do that as well, with the right equipment, it's usually the kinky ones who offer, and despite what people might think, Eliot doesn't like kinky women that much. So Eliot doesn't do girls anymore.

"Come on, don't hold back", Alec says the first time they have sex, "I won't break."  
Of course, they both know better, but at least, after that, Eliot starts to fuck him for real.   
Alec, it turns out, likes it rough, and the bruises Eliot leaves on his wrists barely show against his dark skin. Afterwards, Eliot licks the spots where they should be apologetically, while Alec pets his hair, slowly, gently, like he's afraid Eliot's going to shatter under his hands.

***

Eliot touches his guitar only when he's alone and the door closed behind him. It's not that he's ashamed of his skills, because he knows he's good. It's more that he can't keep up the facade when he plays. The tough attitude just slips away as soon as his fingers touch the strings, leaving him more vulnerable than sex ever does, and that's just something he can't have anyone see. Eliot doesn't need an audience.

Alec is more of a Hip Hop kind of guy, though when it comes to music, he believes himself to be pretty open-minded. Country Rock, however, never did it for him: That's something for retro rednecks who drink beer for breakfast and yowl ballads about dead dogs and cheating girls.   
Which doesn't explain why he feels so choked up when he hears Eliot's rough, smoky voice singing _More than I deserve_ for the first time.

***

Eliot prefers martial arts to fire arms. There are several reasons for it, the most obvious being that weapons are objects, and a man never has complete control over the things he uses, not like he can control his own body.   
Other are: The memory of being tied to a chair, a revolver pressed to his temple, and listening to the clicks when the hammer hits yet another empty chamber. The memory of his father's brain splattered all over the striped wallpaper of their living room, dripping slowly down and into the carpet. Eliot doesn't like guns.

Alec is far from being helpless, but to tell the truth, he doesn't know much about defending himself with his hands. He's a geek, after all, out and proud, and more important, he actually doesn't approve of physical violence, as ridiculous as it may sound.  
Still, he doesn't say no to Eliot's offer to teach him. Not because he wants Eliot to stop teasing. Not because he thinks he's ever going to be any good. But because of the way Eliot looks at him when he says: "Might not be always around to save your ass. Want to be sure that you can do it yourself."


End file.
